Your Name Email address Local Address Street City, State, Zip Phone OBJECTIVE Permanent Address Street City, State, Zip Phone One or two concise, easy-to-read statements focusing on the type of position you are seeking (entry-level), the skills you want to utilize, and/or the tasks in which you want to become involved. Avoid clichés or jargon such as To find a rewarding position in which I can contribute to the profitability of the company. EDUCATION The Pennsylvania State University University Park, PA B.S. in Information Sciences and Technology Emphasis: Minor: if applicable Expected May 200X Cumulative GPA 3.80/4.00 (Put major GPA first if higher than cumulative GPA) You may add other degrees and/or education abroad next in reverse chronological order. You may add certifications achieved such as CISCO, etc. You may add a subheading showing relevant coursework listed by name not number of course (use only as a filler if you do not have enough experience or skills to fill your page). As a senior, no need to list high school. EXPERIENCE List work experiences in reverse chronological order. Remember that your experience need not be a paid position. If you have gained valuable IT experience in a voluntary position, include this in your resume. List name of company, location, dates worked and type of position. Give details of your accomplishments and responsibilities rather than a general list of duties. Numbers (volume, percentages, dollar amounts, etc.) make strong statements and can enhance credibility. Include information and skills relevant to the position you are seeking. Consolidate information whenever possible. Avoid repetition and eliminate excessive details in describing experiences. Use bulleted lists and avoid paragraphs whenever possible. Make the format scannable. Use relevant action verbs first. Become familiar with the terminology of the industry and use these terms whenever possible). Avoid tables, extra lines, pictures and cute images. SKILLS ACTIVITIES HONORS REFERENCES You may consider a special skills section to highlight computer skills (hardware, software, operating systems, databases and organize as such) and certifications or licenses. In the general skills category, list any language skills or highlight special project management or team skills. List important activities in which you held leadership roles first such as offices held in college, community and professional organizations. You can add a brief explanation of your position and accomplishment. Optional: include only if you have several honors. Available Upon Request. If you run out of room on your resume, you do not need to include this, but make sure you have a separate sheet of references available upon request. Prepare a list of three to five references (avoid family) on a separate page formatted to match your resume for use when employers request references. Choose individuals familiar with your academic achievements, leadership and teamwork skills, and/or work habits. Include name, title, organization, mailing address, phone number and email. You should always seek prior approval from individuals you plan to list as references. SEE SAMPLE RESUME BELOW
JOHN T. STUDENT Jts100@psu.edu Campus Address Permanent Address 123 College Street 456 West Drive State College, PA 16801 Pittsburgh, PA 15205 (814) 555-5555 (412) 777-7777 OBJECTIVE: To obtain an Information Sciences and Technology internship position, beginning Summer 2004 with special interest in networking or database applications. EDUCATION: The Pennsylvania State University University Park, PA BS in Information Sciences and Technology expected May 20XX Minor: Supply Chain and Information Systems GPA 3.56/4.00 Relevant Courses Introduction to IST Networking and Telecommunications Organization of Data Databases EXPERIENCE: McDonalds Pittsburgh, PA Summers 20XX, 20XX Assistant Manager and Cashier Supervised front-line operations and reported directly to the manager. Responsible for entire operation in manager s absence. Interviewed, hired and trained new employees. Provided performance feedback. Developed system for monitoring inventory; decreased inventory time by 50% and increased sales by 25%. Kaufmanns Monroeville, PA June 20XX September 20XX Department Assistant Promoted from cashier after only one month Arranged displays to be pleasing to the eye Enjoyed selling clothes to a wide clientele, from business executives to teenagers SKILLS: Problem-based Solutions Project management JavaScript XML Team-building C++ programming Visual Basic Oracle Integrated application Network design SQL Linux ACTIVITIES: Member of the Association for Computing Machinery 2001 present IST Student Government, Field Trip Committee 2001 present Intramural Soccer 2000 2002 REFERENCES: Available upon request
Other Resume Writing Tips: Resume should be one-page. If you need to compose two pages, make sure your heading and page 2 are listed on the second page. You should never use less than a 10 pt. font. Recruiters have trouble reading anything smaller. Avoid expressing ideas, goals or future aspirations in your resume. Save these for interview questions if applicable. Your resume should consist of facts that present yourself clearly, succinctly and confidently. Select keywords carefully in your resume. Keywords are the basis of most electronic resume search and retrieval processes. They represent the nouns and phrases that highlight technical and professional areas of expertise, industryrelated jargon, projects, achievements and other distinctive features about a prospect s work history that provide the content from which to search for a resume in a database. Scannable Paper Resumes: Send original laser printed resumes, not photocopies or faxes Use light-colored 8 ½ x 11 paper printed on one side only Use non-decorative typefaces, sized 10 to 14 points. Use only one font type for the resume. Do not use graphics, shading, script fonts, italics, underlining, bullets, parentheses, brackets or bold-faced text. Do not use horizontal or vertical lines. Use wide margins around the text. Do not fold or staple your resume. Your name should be the first readable item on each page; keep it separate from the addresses. Remember to use action words, and key words important to your field E-Resumes: ASCII Plain Text (directions to use in the body of email message or e-form on internet company site only) Set your margins so that you have 6.5 inches of text displayed. Compose a resume from scratch or open an existing resume in your word processor. Select all of the text and then select a 12 pt. font such as Courier 12. This will give you 65 characters per line, which will accommodate most email programs. Save your resume as a text only file with line breaks. Note: if you have used hard carriage returns at the end of paragraphs instead of lines, save as text only without the line breaks Open this file in Notepad, or any other text editor that you can cut and paste text into. Replace all bullets and underlining with their ASCII equivalent. Bullets can be replaced by asterisks (*) or hyphens(-). If you see long lines of text in your editor, use Notepad s word wrap feature under the Edit menu. If you have used hard carriage returns in your composition, do not use the word wrap feature. Remove all tabs, and where space is required use the spacebar. Use spaces to separate paragraphs. Copy and paste the text of the resume into the body of a test email message to yourself, once you are satisfied with the way it looks in your text editor. Create a short cover letter using the same steps as above. Insert this text above the resume in the email message. Do not send the cover letter separately as an email attachment. Send a copy of this email message to yourself and a friend who has a different email program, before sending it to the recruiter. ASCII Hypertext Resumes (.htm or.html file format) Provides added flexibility in formatting the electronic resume. Should integrate traditional resume development with basic Web page design strategies. Unlike Web-based resume databases that attract the attention of employers and recruiters by promoting their large databases, job seekers using Web resumes must attract the attention of interested employers and recruiters on their own by using other self-marketing techniques in a coordinated job search campaign. ASCII Rich Text (.rtf extension) To send your resume as an email attachment, use ASCII rich text resumes (.rtf extension). Make sure your recipient s email system supports the rich text format extension.
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